Thursday 15 March 2012

For Noah

For Noah

To me you were like the butterfly of a warm spring day
I dared not breathe lest you fly away
Gracing my anticipating skin on your way momentarily
For the brief and blessed time that you chose me

Young blossoms of spring can all testify
Of the beautiful things that too quickly die
For a short and glorious time here to bloom
All the more lovely for ending so soon

How many dark, cold winter nights I hoped to see your face
Bargains with malevolent gods as I prayed to take your place
I remember how delicate and perfect, the way you were made
Though 100 springs pass by, my memory of you will not fade

Friday 9 March 2012

Post pregnancy body

Heard stories of women who are back in their pre-pregnancy jeans the day after delivery?  It's urban legend.  Always someone who knows someone who's cousin managed this impossible magic trick.

Here I am 2 months after birth and my body is still not my own.  Well, it is, but I just don't recognise it much.  My pre-pregnancy clothes remain tucked up in vacuum-sealed packs under the bed.  I survive in leggings and even still wear my maternity trousers.  The scale says I am about 15 pounds heavier than at the start of the pregnancy.  But the differences in my body are not accurately reflected in body weight alone.  My once firm leg muscles are all lazy and floppy.  So I imagine that even losing that extra 15 pounds wouldn't make me look and feel that same as before.  I am going to have to burn some fat as well as build up some muscle again.

couch potato times are not helping to shift the preggo pounds

While walking is ok in moderation, proper exercise isn't recommended for 6-8 weeks after delivery.  Longer for c-section mums like me, so I might be looking at 12 weeks before I can begin in earnest.  I am further set-back by an infection of my wound, and will have to be more cautious than I'm used to in my workouts.
out for a walk with the emerging daffodils

Post-pregnancy workouts have their own specific considerations.  Abdominals are still working their way back into alignment so any movements that use them have to be carefully selected.  Using the rectus abdominus (the muscles of the old 'six-pack') too soon can result in something called doming.  This is when the muscles do not realign, leaving a gap in the middle and a permanent disfigurement.  Also, workouts that are too intense or when calories are not replaced can negatively affect breastfeeding.

Then there are the things that only time can fix.  Swelling above the c-section incision site can take months to smooth out.  And even though it's thought that breastfeeding helps burn off fat accumulated during pregnancy, the hormones active during breastfeeding can also force the body to hold onto 5-10 pounds.  Not to mention that the average increase in breast size can account for about 2 pounds of the extra weight packed on in pregnancy.

Good news is, it's still winter.  Comfortable, baggy knitwear doesn't look out of place.  But even now the daffodils and crocus are bursting up form the soil.  Soon my snug-fitting summer wardrobe will be calling me.  I'm attempting an approach of amusement and amazement at my body.  Along with weaning myself off pregnant-lady portions of dinner and some exercise should see me right in time.

Besides, post-pregnancy body isn't just about weight and body-shape.  There's so much more going on.  I find it fascinating, a little frightening at times and all very interesting.  Hope you do, too.

1. Hair
     All the good things that happened to my hair during pregnancy are still here.  It's thicker and grew long over the 9 months.  It's a great comfort to be happy at least with my hair if nothing else.  A wonderful treat for me was to get my hair dyed, finally, after 9 long months of unsightly roots.  Before becoming pregnant, I regularly dyed my hair jet black. After 9 months of no dying, I had a good 5 inches of natural hair.  I found a colourist who embarked on the process of getting the black out of the ends with me.  After some hours of lifting, bleaching and tinting my hair is back to a natural shade, slightly umph-ed up with a few cleverly placed highlights.  So my ass is fat.  But my hair looks great.

2. Under-eye bags?  That's just an excuse for some fun eye makeup!
    It hardly bears writing about sleep-deprivation.  It is a guaranteed given for the first few months, or if my mother is right, the next 30 years.  After a night of mere minutes sleep, I remind myself of the days when sleep was happily sacrificed for fun.  Thom and I would go out, dance up a storm and waking up tired the next day just meant that it was a good night.  My eyes show the signs, though.  Puffy with dark circles.  I considered using the fab hair to hide them, but I need to see to avoid tripping over the various baby things that now litter the floors.  Next best option - eye treats.  Little potions that come as roll-ons or moisturising creams that smell nice or a new mascara all help hide those sleepy peepers.  As soon as Ethan goes down for his first nap of the day, I grab myself a few minutes of face-time to treat those tired eyes to something nice.  It's what baby naps were invented for!

3.  How little other people care
     Makes me wonder what I ever worried about.  No, I'm not the fit little chickie I was.  But who even notices?  And of those who notice, who of them care?  The answer to both is pretty much none.  Friends still have compliments for me, despite my feeling so different and out of place in my own skin.  As for Thom, I can truly say that he has seen my body at the absolute worst.  Following the c-section, and all the trauma surrounding us during that time he's had a front row seat for the horror show that was my cut-up franken-belly.  He was the one who helped me into the first shower after the operation.  He fetched the big, old lady panties for me from the store.  He has become accustomed to the sight of me attached un-glamorously to the end of an electric breast pump.  And he still says he I look nice (maybe more after my eye-treatment routine) and gives my butt a little naughty pat when the opportunity presents itself.  Getting back into shape is still the goal, but there's a little lesson to be learned here about the validity of self-obsessed body hang ups that might grab hold of me at this point.  They will only make this time of life stressful and make me dismissive of all the positive feedback about my slightly chubby frame.  Maybe those that mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.




Sunday 4 March 2012

Before and After: Discovering parenthood

Where does the time go?  Somehow, now that days are divided into 3-4 hourly feeds, interspersed with naps, snuggles and various incidents in the diaper region, days fly by and I suddenly realise how very long its been since my last post.  How very long its been since a lot of things, actually.  Long showers, painting fingernails, drinking a cup of tea when it's hot.  Surprisingly to me - someone who loves hot showers, nice nails and loathes cold tea - these differences only occur to me as I sit here now and purposefully reflect on the the before-and-after of my life.

Before, I might have imagined these changes as a problem.  I know that friends and readers without children could find it hard to believe that the ways you change as a parent provide reasons for joy, laughter and general amazement that life could have ever been any other way.

For instance, this morning, I attempted to give Thom a hair cut.  Before, a quick mohawk shave for Thom was part of the weekend routine, situated in between pieces of toast or croissants and strong, Sunday morning coffees.  Today, we had to employ precision timing to get this simple, everyday task done-and-dusted between Wriggly Man's feeds and naps.  After 10 minutes of silence through the baby monitor, we thought it a safe window to get the clippers out.  But Wriggly, who must be a little psychic, woke up screaming just as Thom's head was half shaved.  We hurried through (and I'm afraid this week's mohawk might be a little crooked) so I could quickly get to Ethan and comfort him.  Covered in hair clippings is no way to snuggle a baby, so I stripped down and legged it up to little man in the old birthday suit.  Ah, the big adventures that come with such a little person.

Here's a few other odd things I've noticed in parenthood:
1. Fascination with Faeces
      Baby poo is gross.  Unless it's your baby's poo, and then it's an event.  We look to it like tea leaves, saying to each other, So that's why he's been so fussy, look at that poo! It's a suitable conversation topic at any time of the day.  It's colour, consistency, timing, smell are all very, VERY interesting.  It's difficult to say what changes as a parent.  The poo still stinks.  It's still poo, and we still recoil and wash it off clothes and hands with appropriate disgust.  But it also like a little window into baby's world.  A small way we begin to understand and identify with him.  By analysing his poo, we can say to him and each other, Yes, I would also feel happy/upset/content after a poo like that.

2. Sleep is optional
      Everyone asks, Are you sleeping?  I would say, yes, except that what counts as sleep now is totally different than before.  A few stolen moments of closed eyes, when you fall instantly into a dream about doing the thing you are about to do in a minute when you wake - that counts as sleep.  So when I get an hour between 2 and 3 am, I feel practically refreshed.  Thom said to me last night that he noticed a new forehead wrinkle on his face.  I'm hardly surprised.  We look really old as we get up in the morning.  Pre-coffee, bed-head, under-eye-baggage zombie-looking people.  It would be easy for us at this point to snap and snarl at each other's ugly faces.  But once Ethan is fed and playing on his sheepskin in the morning light, we are again restored and ready to face the day on mere minutes of sleep.

3. Enjoying giving up things you enjoy
     Before you have a baby, people say to you that you'll never have a hot meal/night out/a cent to your name again.  All of this is true.  And so many more minor things go out the window as baby enters the front door.  What these negative-ninnies don't mention is that you won't mind.  Baby's happiness and calm means more than all these worldly treasures and you'll find that you'll willingly sacrifice most things in exchange for a peaceful little person.  Just the other day I found myself pillaging AAA batteries from all available devices to get Ethan's Slumber Buddy working again.  This frog-shaped nightlight, complete with lullabies and heart-beat sounds is intended to send baby off to dreamland.  And for that I thought we could survive without a TV remote, wireless mouse or any other gizmo that previously would have been sorely missed.

4. You go a little bit insane, but it's all good
      For one thing, we have become obsessive.  I wonder what Thom and I ever talked about before Wriggly Man.  Whether we are debating the meaning of a particular tone of cry, laughing a his funny little ways or day-dreaming about his future all we seem to talk about is Ethan.  Even when we aren't talking about him, the subject matter is tangentially related to him.  What's for dinner?  Well, what can be cooked in time before he wakes up for a feed?
     We have lost our minds in other ways, too.  The things that seem normal, or even desirable now would be inconceivable to a person in their right mind.  Basic baby-tending behaviour sounds insane sometimes and even more so for the fact that these crazy things we do for baby feel ok.  If baby's nose is stuffed up, sucking the snot out of it seems like the best thing to do.  Sucking the snot out of somebody else's nose is normal.  Who'd have imagined? If baby is gnawing and pulling at my breast, I wonder if he doesn't like the taste today.  Sounds crazy.   There is no doubt that we have lost our minds, but it feels alright.

5. Baby crying is less annoying than you might imagine
      It's not annoying at all.  It is, however, heart-breaking.  Before baby, when you hear a baby cry in on an airplane or in the supermarket it is a difficult sound to tolerate.  But since Ethan, the crying is nothing like those times.  If we can divine what the crying might  be about - hungry, sleepy, cold - it isn't so bad because we can do something.  We spring into action with the calm assurance that crying will soon be comforted with whatever it is he needs.  But Ethan has no other way of communicating with us and sometimes we don't get it.  The sound of him crying is utterly tragic to us when we can't fix it.  Minutes feel like hours when he cries, but not because of annoyance.  It's because we want to cry with him.  I take it as all part of us gelling as a little emerging family.  When one cries, we are all sad.  But also when one is happy, we all smile.